


Secrets and Sorrows

by orphan_account



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: Episode: s04e22: These Are The Voyages..., Gen, Kinda, Scene Rewrite, i ended up fudging with the timeline a little but eh, i made myself sad thinking about this so now y'all have to be too, i'm crying you're crying we're all crying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-18
Updated: 2017-11-18
Packaged: 2019-02-03 19:39:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12754851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: I was reminded ofone of the outtakes from TATVand then this happened. Thanks!! I’m sad now.





	Secrets and Sorrows

**Author's Note:**

> Title from [While the Candle Still Burns](https://youtu.be/IhLnZn4vJY4) by Thriving Ivory, though the song itself has little to do with the fic
> 
> I know Will's little interviews with the crewmembers are supposed to take place before Trip's death but this wouldn't leave my head okay I'm sorry I've been in an angsty mood lately
> 
> Also - WHY IS THIS THE FIRST TUCKERREED THAT I FINISH

“He was anything but tactful—what his countrymen might refer to as a hick,” Reed says as he helps Will to roll out the dough for tonight’s dinner. “For the life of me, I couldn’t understand what Captain Archer saw in him.”

William keeps an eye on the lieutenant’s progress as he listens—this might only be a holoprogram, but dammit if he’s gonna let the holo-crew ruin holo-Chef’s preparations. “Thinner,” he interrupts. “Roll it a little bit thinner, like this.”

“Oh, right. Right.” Reed reapplies himself to his task as shown, brows furrowing in concentration. He seems recalcitrant to continue telling him about Commander Tucker, and William silently curses himself; he should have known better than to stop the private man just as he was starting to open up. But when all you know of someone is stories…

“Go on,” he prompts.

“That’s about it, really,” the lieutenant shrugs. “I used to think that first impressions _meant_ something. I guess it’s not always true.” William glances across the workbench at him, raising his eyebrows slightly, but wisely he doesn’t say anything this time. “You know, to be honest, I didn’t think he was gonna last a month, old friend of the captain’s or not. And now,” he says softly, a far-off look in his eyes as his hands still over his rolling pin, “I can’t imagine what these last ten years would’ve been like without him.”

Reed catches his eyes then, and his expression… This is the most open he’s been with him, and Will has to drop his gaze to his pin to say what he wants to ask next. “Did you find yourself attracted to him?”

“That’s a bit of a… rude, _personal_ question,” Reed answers haltingly, dissolving at the end into quiet laughter.

A smile tugs at the corner of William’s mouth as well. He supposes it is, but, with what he knew of Lieutenant Reed and his relationship with the commander, well, he had to know. When he looks up from the dough to apologize, he finds that the lieutenant’s shoulders are no longer shaking with laughter but with barely restrained sobs, tears threatening to fall from eyes trained down on the workbench between them.

“It was more than that,” Reed whispers, “but yes. I did.”

The apology dies in his throat, and his hands still, fingers tightening minutely around the pin; he wasn’t expecting this, such a raw, open confession, not from him. He realizes he’s gaping, closes his mouth, swallows. Then: “I’m sorry.” He doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t know if he even _should_ say anything, but he feels he has to.

Reed’s gaze flicks up to meet his. “Sorry won’t bring him back.” The defensiveness fades from his posture as he drops his hands to his sides, shoulders falling, and William knows then that the man wasn’t angry at him, but at the Tenebians, at the universe for being so cruel as to take the man he loves away from him after all they’ve been through, after all the other things that should have killed them but that they survived anyway.

“Here,” Will says, grabbing a towel from the counter behind him and handing it to the lieutenant. When Reed merely glances at it before raising an eyebrow at him, he explains, “A clean kitchen towel is less conspicuous than a uniform sleeve,” nodding for him to take it.

He presses his lips into a thin smile as he accepts the proffered towel, turning away to dab at his eyes. William walks around the counter to rest a comforting hand on his shoulder, squeezing softly, soothingly, when the man stiffens slightly under the unexpected touch and looks up to turn startled eyes on him.

“If you need anyone to talk to, I’m here.” It might be a lie, at least in that he doubts he’ll have the time to stick with the holoprogram long enough to offer the man any more comfort than this, but he hopes that Chef was there for Malcolm—or would have been there, if the lieutenant gave him the chance—since he was so well-loved and trusted by the crew and had at times acted as their unofficial counselor.

“Thank you,” Reed says, softening, before slipping out from under his hand and turning to give him back the towel. “I might take you up on that, but not right now.”

William nods his understanding and watches as he turns to go. Before the man’s gotten more than halfway across the room, he orders, “Computer, freeze program.” He discards the towel on the workbench and strides over to that melancholy figure, takes his head in a hand, and leans down to press a kiss to his temple, like how he had with T’Pol earlier.

He drops his hand and takes a step back, just looking at him for a moment. Reed’s already smaller than William expected him to be, but he looks even smaller now, like this—lost, heartbroken. He sighs.

“Computer, resume program.”

**Author's Note:**

> I didn’t realize until skimming through the Memory Alpha page today that the aliens aren’t Rigelians; I’d always just assumed that they were because the crew met them on Rigel X (I don’t remember what they look like, okay). Memory Alpha also says that the two aliens might be Tenebians [[more info](http://memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Rigel_X_green_gangster_001#Green_001)], so I went with that


End file.
